Putting the Pieces Together
by Smile Life Away
Summary: Written for the Revisiting Challenge. Alice Longbottom remembered pain, but she also remembered love.


A/N: Written for the Revisiting Challenge I was assigned Alice Longbottom about 2,000 words and Romance along with another genre.

**Thanks to MinionsOfTheNachoArmyUnite for betaing this for me**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

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Alice knew the way love stories were supposed to go; boy meets girl, they fall in love, they have beautiful children, and they live happily ever after. For that reason, she knew that hers had gone horribly wrong. After all, streams of light and intense pain had no place in love stories.

His scream was what brought her downstairs. Thankfully, Neville was at his grandmother's house; that way he would not have to see anything. Grabbing a wand she raced below and began to throw curses at the masked Death Easters, some Unforgivables. Soon she was in a duel with Rodolphus Lestrange, jets of green and red light flew past her head, and then:

"Crucio!" she heard from a pale, haughty, beautiful woman with crazy black curls.

The woman cackled at her screams and made no effort to stop the pain, though she was getting no information from it, not that she had asked for any.

Alice felt her wand slipping from her grasp but held it tighter, her arm struggling to lift up so that she could fight back. She fought to remember all of her training, but there was nothing she could do. A thousand knives were cutting all over her body, and Frank was lying there on the ground, writhing and screaming in pain.

_She floats across the room, long gray hair swaying, with eyes glazed over and far away._

_'Pretty boy' she thinks while looking at the stranger, 'I wish I had a pretty boy,'_

_Today the boy brings home a girl, one that Alice has never seen before. A girl with a pretty name- 'Hannah.' she repeats it in her head and hands the girl a present before glancing back up at the boy and smiling at the familiar face._

_"Hello mum." The pretty boy says, and Alice listens to him speak,not really taking in what he is saying. "We're getting married…" he finally says and Alice remembers that word- marriage. And she remembers wearing a puffy white dress and a smiling man, waiting for her. But by the time she forms the words, the room is empty and the pretty boy is gone, as is the girl with the pretty name that he is marrying._

_Alice feels sad that he is gone, but there is nothing she can really do, so Alice sings. She does so quietly, so as not to awake the sleeping man in the room, and time passes while she does so._

_"Mrs. Longbottom" she turns, because she is the only female in the room, so the woman in the green robes must be speaking to her. "Miss Longbottom, I want you to meet our newest Healer, she's going to…" and then Alice drifts before she can catch the girl's name._

_She does look at her though, and the girl reminds her of a china doll, because she is so perfect looking, as if her every feature was crafted. And it scares Alice at first because she is speaking, and how do dolls speak? But then she smiles, and she looks a bit more human._

_The girl-doll comes to see her every day, and smiles, her smiles start out timid but every moment they get more confident, and she brings Alice sweets, like the pretty boy that she only sees at Christmas. And the doll tells her about falling in love, and how she is falling in love with someone that her parents disapprove of. Though Alice has never heard of this person before, she doesn't like him very much when the girl starts to describe him, how he is arrogant and full of himself, and the way he treats everyone else. But the more the girl talks the more Alice's dislike for this boy dwindles away. Because he does seem sweet and she pities him and she knows that he loves this girl more than she even guesses._

_And Alice starts to remember love._

"Potter said that we won't last." Frank brushed his hands through his hair while he said this, "he said you'll move on."

"Potter's an idiot." Alice countered and took his hands in hers. "I think we'll last longer than anyone expects." Standing on her tip-toes she reached up and pressed her lips to his before quickly pulling away. "Now we're going to be late for potions." She pulled him with her, and as she turned to face him, she noticed a smile that was refusing to leave his face.

_There are so many things she wants to tell the doll, but the words do not come, and instead she just stares at her and realizes how real she becomes the longer she stays, and that she still doesn't know her name. Sometimes the girl is in love with this man and he is all she talks about the entire visit. But sometimes she hates him, and instead talks about nonsense like her sister's wedding and how she was bored and made about a million cookies. When this happens, she always brings Alice some. Always Alice likes to watch her eyes because they are a bright green and they remind Alice of something exciting, yet they also remind her of something painful. So she usually has to look away_.

She joined Frank where he was sitting by the lake in the pouring rain.

"You okay?" She collapsed on the wet grass beside him, and brushed a strand of wet hair out of his face.

"We're seventh years."

"Yes, that is a true fact."

"I mean, I put all of my bets on being an auror."

"And you will be one, you're amazing Frank."

"Yeah, sure… but you're even better."

"Maybe, but that still doesn't mean you won't pass your qualifying exams. Besides, they're not for a few years anyway."

"Still, what about everyone else who wants to be-"

"Frank." Alice sighed, "You can do it, and so can I, we're going to be the best auror's in history."

"Doesn't that sound a bit childish?"

"Not really. We're already some of the best duelers in our year."

"You're better than me."

"You're better than Potter." And he calmed down and wrapped his arm around her waist.

"Thanks Alice."

"What for?"

"Everything."

He leaned in and kissed her, and she wrapped her arms around his neck and deepened the kiss, forgetting about the pouring rain.

_Today the porcelain doll is crying, or at least she has been. Her eyes are rimmed in red and her cheeks are tear-stained._

_"Hi Alice." She murmurs and not waiting for an answer launches into how much she hates everyone and how she is going to move to France. Alice remembers the word for that- bluff. "I mean, my parents are threatening to disown me…and he is being completely selfish about the whole thing, and his mother is being so nice to me, but I just want to kill his dad and…"_

_Alice can't think of words. She just knows that she doesn't like to see this girl cry, because she has been so nice to her._

She sat next to Frank Longbottom in 6th year because he was the only other Gryffindor in their N.E.W.T level Herbology class. Though she found the class to be extraordinarily dull and only took it because it was necessary to be an auror, he found something intriguing about plants, something that was beyond her.

They spent almost the entire period talking because Alice hated the class and Frank was already so good that he never needed to pay attention.

"I was wondering…if…maybe… you wanted to go out with me, to Hogsmeade…sometime…" his face turned red as he said it, and Alice smiled because two months from when she had sat beside him, he had finally asked.

"Sure," she kept the confidence that defined her and did not scream until she was sure that she was alone.

_Today, the doll does not come, but the pretty boy and the girl with the nice name do._

_"Hello mum." He says, and she takes the candy that he offers her. Alice looks into his eyes, too, and although they are not exciting, they are comforting and warm and so she does not want to look away. "…Come to the wedding…" he is saying and Alice listens with her head quirked to one side. "...Hannah's idea…if you want…" and she smiles because she's not sure what else she should do. But apparently that is all the pretty boy needs because he smiles widely, and his smile reminds her of someone else's._

"I love you, Alice." Frank kneeled down in his mother's living room, looking extremely nervous. "Will you marry me?"

Alice shrieked, and sure it was not like anything she had ever done before, but she had never been proposed to either.

Augusta Longbottom ran into the room just as he slipped the ring on her finger, and even she offered a small smile, because try as she might to hide it, she really did like Alice. And Alice smiled back widely and continued to do so until all of her muscles were sore.

_"Alice!" Today, the girl is back, and she throws her arms around the woman as soon as she enters the room. "Alice! Alice!" she holds out her hand so that Alice can see the diamond ring glittering on her finger. "Alice, I'm getting married! I mean, we're going to wait, of course, but…! Oh, isn't it exciting? And I love him! I love him! I love him!" and she is dancing around the room and just won't calm down, and Alice is excited, too, because there are no more tears falling from those bright green eyes. Those brilliant eyes, so full of she knows she should be afraid of that color, but instead she is getting a thrill from it._

"You know Alice; I think you enjoy fighting just a bit too much." Frank said, looking slightly concerned.

"Why shouldn't I?" she shot a curse at a Death Eater while a jet of green barely missed her head. "When I'm old and gray, then I'll talk about how much I regret all of the risks I took, but not now."

_They are both here today- the pretty doll girl who cannot stop smiling and the pretty boy with the familiar smile- but not the girl with the nice name. They are not smiling at each other, but neither are they glaring. They are talking like civilized people, like friends, but they both seem extremely tense, as if the conversation is trying on the both of them, not that Alice is listening. Still, she remembers conversations like that, and how they almost always end in tears._

"Mum, we just want Neville to stay with you tonight." Frank said calmly, "There is nothing to be worried about."

"Nothing at all." Alice added. "Dumbledore just wants to take extra precautions; ever since You-Know-Who fell some of the really loyal Death Eaters are going a bit crazy. It's nothing to be worried about. But it will make Dumbledore feel better if Neville's not with us."

"We are well known Aurors." Frank cut in.

"But…" and Augusta Longbottom's voice was cracking.

"You have nothing to worry about, mum." Frank leaned over and kissed her cheek, and Alice handed her the sleeping baby. "I promise."

_Alice remembers pain. But she does not actually feel it, just a dim memory of wanting everything to stop, but not being able to make it happen. And at the pretty boy's wedding, sitting next to the girl, who looks very much like a doll today, Alice feels the thrill and the thousands of emotions that come with love._

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**A/N: Please Review.**


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